ACADEMIC RESEARCH BOTH PUBLISHED AND WORK IN PROGRESS
Links to other writings not featured here are below at end of page.
Racism and Classism in Mexican Advertising: An Exhibition of Visual Messaging
link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-91986-7_13
This paper explores how Mexico’s population has been faced with the polemics of class and race. This division continues today through the Mexican ruling class’s appropriation of advertising. I am interested in the functions and systems in place that allow this to propagate and how meaning is being reproduced unperceived by the audience.
Version en esp aqui pagina 87:
researchonline.rca.ac.uk/4845/1/Expresiones%20contemporaneas%20de%20los%20racismos%20en%20México.pdf
link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-91986-7_13
This paper explores how Mexico’s population has been faced with the polemics of class and race. This division continues today through the Mexican ruling class’s appropriation of advertising. I am interested in the functions and systems in place that allow this to propagate and how meaning is being reproduced unperceived by the audience.
Version en esp aqui pagina 87:
researchonline.rca.ac.uk/4845/1/Expresiones%20contemporaneas%20de%20los%20racismos%20en%20México.pdf
Decoding myth-making through Semiotics in-order to Decolonize advertising.
This 2024 paper (published as a chapter in 'Semiotics and Visual Communication IV: Myths of Today'- link below) investigates the current visual practise and printed expression of 2D visual communication in Mexico City by focusing on a billboard advertising campaign for the luxury Mexican department store Palacio de Hierro. First the 2D advertising is deconstructed through the analysis of advertising tools & techniques supported through semiotic & design theory. This is followed by a Visual Social Semiotics analysis influenced by various semioticians such as: Roland Barthes’s application of Saussure's semiotic theory (1974) applied to popular visual culture in Rhetoric of the Image(1977c) (1999); Danesi’s observations on media semiotics (1999, 2013); Harrison (2003) Jewitt & Olyama (2001) on Visual Social Semiotics, and Stuart Hall’s observations on audiences through encoding and decoding (1980). Then the final research method applied to understand the campaign from a consumer perspective is Photo elicitation (Glaw 2017).
The objective of this analysis is to uncover the primary and secondary messaging broadcast by the advertisements to the consumer through semiotics, and map how the messaging is constructed through the application of advertising tools and techniques.
TO BUY BOOK; https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-0364-0548-9/
TO READ CHAPTER: medium.com/@CarlWJones/decoding-myth-making-through-semiotics-in-order-to-decolonize-advertising-5ff584a2f972
This 2024 paper (published as a chapter in 'Semiotics and Visual Communication IV: Myths of Today'- link below) investigates the current visual practise and printed expression of 2D visual communication in Mexico City by focusing on a billboard advertising campaign for the luxury Mexican department store Palacio de Hierro. First the 2D advertising is deconstructed through the analysis of advertising tools & techniques supported through semiotic & design theory. This is followed by a Visual Social Semiotics analysis influenced by various semioticians such as: Roland Barthes’s application of Saussure's semiotic theory (1974) applied to popular visual culture in Rhetoric of the Image(1977c) (1999); Danesi’s observations on media semiotics (1999, 2013); Harrison (2003) Jewitt & Olyama (2001) on Visual Social Semiotics, and Stuart Hall’s observations on audiences through encoding and decoding (1980). Then the final research method applied to understand the campaign from a consumer perspective is Photo elicitation (Glaw 2017).
The objective of this analysis is to uncover the primary and secondary messaging broadcast by the advertisements to the consumer through semiotics, and map how the messaging is constructed through the application of advertising tools and techniques.
TO BUY BOOK; https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-0364-0548-9/
TO READ CHAPTER: medium.com/@CarlWJones/decoding-myth-making-through-semiotics-in-order-to-decolonize-advertising-5ff584a2f972
Interrogating democracy in the digital gaze.
researchonline.rca.ac.uk/4404/
medium.com/@CarlWJones/interrogating-democracy-in-the-digital-gaze-337f16c9b4e7
This Multi-Piece Portfolio project explores the digital gaze, questions the democracy of Google, and investigates the type of visual registry provided, by asking: Is the digital gaze a Caucasian heterosexual male gaze? Christopher Frayling claims that ‘research through art and design’ is one of three research methods that artists could select in order to perform academic research. I, however, reverse the name of the method from ‘research through art’ to ‘art through research’. Performed in two phases, the first phase of the Digital Gaze project is academic research that is followed by phase two – the artistic expression informed by the first phase, hence the term ‘Art through Research’.
researchonline.rca.ac.uk/4404/
medium.com/@CarlWJones/interrogating-democracy-in-the-digital-gaze-337f16c9b4e7
This Multi-Piece Portfolio project explores the digital gaze, questions the democracy of Google, and investigates the type of visual registry provided, by asking: Is the digital gaze a Caucasian heterosexual male gaze? Christopher Frayling claims that ‘research through art and design’ is one of three research methods that artists could select in order to perform academic research. I, however, reverse the name of the method from ‘research through art’ to ‘art through research’. Performed in two phases, the first phase of the Digital Gaze project is academic research that is followed by phase two – the artistic expression informed by the first phase, hence the term ‘Art through Research’.
|
The World According to Dave Trott: An Interviewwww.westminsterpapers.org/article/id/287/
medium.com/@CarlWJones/the-world-according-to-dave-trott-an-interview-7f51f68e9e4 For WPCC’s issue on ‘Advertising for the Human Good’ issue editor Carl W. Jones asked Trott to consider the potential of advertising for the human good with wide-ranging answers given on major questions: should advertising have such a role?; is university education a hinderance to creativity; and whether much of advertising can be considered ‘pollution’. |
|
How Mexican advertising featuring rich white people perpetuates racism and classism
theconversation.com/how-mexican-advertising-featuring-rich-white-people-perpetuates-racism-and-classism-106655
medium.com/@CarlWJones/la-publicidad-en-méxico-perpetúa-el-racismo-y-el-clasismo-118b99cf60f2 Since before it became an independent nation state in 1821, Mexico’s population has been troubled by issues of race and class. When Europeans arrived to colonise the Americas more than 500 years ago, they introduced a social hierarchy based on skin colour and race that persists to this day. |
|
If advertising reflects society, then advertising is racist.
medium.com/@CarlWJones/if-advertising-reflects-society-then-advertising-is-racist-24316a86c104
in various neighbourhoods around Mexico City over 4,000 posters have appeared challenging the advertising community to produce less racist messaging. With headlines such as ‘Whites are 10% of the population but are in 70% of the ads.’ |
|
Brands may support Black Lives Matter, but advertising still needs to decolonise
theconversation.com/brands-may-support-black-lives-matter-but-advertising-still-needs-to-decolonise-133394
Brands such as Nike and Adidas to PG Tips and Space NK have been expressing solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement by issuing statements and adverts of support – from Nike playing with their memorable tagline of “Just Do It” by asking consumers “for once, Don’t Do It” to the #Solidariteahashtag taken up by many tea brands. Many of these messages have been accompanied by promises to take a hard look at each company’s history and current working practises to see what changes can be made to address structural racism. |
|
ADVERTISING TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES APPROPRIATED TO CONSTRUCT THE GLOBAL BRAND MR. CLEAN westminsterresearch.westminster.ac.uk/download/1e7286f350aeae5af99f1fbe29269e696ceda03511587e2e037d2594ade5f9f8/519897/ADVERTISING%20TOOLS%20AND%20TECHNIQUES%20APPROPRIATED%20TO%20CONSTRUCT%20THE%20GLOBAL%20BRAND%20MR.%20CLEAN.pdf
As a knowledge worker for over twenty-five years in the advertising system, I created branded communications on behalf of corporations. Using my marketing experience coupled with research into techniques and methods appropriated by the advertising industry I will demonstrate how the creators of brand messaging use advertising tools & techniques to express branded concepts. |
|
VIDEO COURSE ON SEMIOTICS
massolit.io/courses/semiotics
Semiotics In this lecture, Carl Jones (University of Westminster) will discuss semiotics. In the first module, we look at how semiotics is connected to media studies. After this, we will look at the semiotics thinker Roland Barthes. Then, we will look at some definitions and applications in the field of semiotics. In the fourth module, we look at some of the key ideas in semiotics. Then, we look at how we carry out semiotic analysis in media studies. Finally, we look at critiques of Barthes, other semiotics thinkers, and some new approaches. |
|
How the Black Lives Matter movement is changing advertising globally — and why other communities are speaking up too
roastbrief.us/how-the-black-lives-matter-movement-is-changing-advertising-globally-and-why-other-communities-are-speaking-up-too/
medium.com/@CarlWJones/how-the-black-lives-matter-movement-is-changing-advertising-globally-and-why-other-communities-c31d514065e6 Typically, advertising contains two messages, one from the brand and one that reflects cultural thinking. Examples include adverts selling cleaning products that show stereotypes of women as housewives, or tech adverts that depict white men as head of companies. These messages re-enforce how society thinks. Across the world, brands such as Nike and PayPal have been expressing solidarity with the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement by issuing statements and adverts of support—from Nike adapting their memorable tagline of “Just Do It” by asking consumers “for once, Don’t Do It”, to the $500 million donation from PayPal. In the post-Black Lives Matter movement period, adverts in the UK and US appear to represent a more diverse representation of race, undoubtedly also thanks to the positive impact of the BLM movement. But has the Black Lives Matter movement made an impact in causing other races to be less discriminated elsewhere? |
|
Balenciaga’s controversial new campaign and the long history of ‘shockvertising
medium.com/@CarlWJones/balenciagas-controversial-new-campaign-and-the-long-history-of-shockvertising-446026d5a145
theconversation.com/balenciagas-controversial-new-campaign-and-the-long-history-of-shockvertising-195778 Kim Kardashian is refining her personal brand. Right-wing news outlet Fox TV is gaining viewers through attention-grabbing headlines. Photographer Gabriele Galimberti is gaining notoriety. All this is due to a recent advertising campaign from leading global fashion brand Balenciaga that has caused widespread controversy. One photograph shows a child in a string vest holding a bondage gear-clad teddy bear. Another shows a handbag resting on paperwork about child abuse. Balenciaga responded to the backlash to its campaign by issuing an apology that blamed the set designers and photographers for the uncomfortable messages. It has also filed a US$25 million lawsuit against the campaign’s producers. |
|
SI LA PUBLICIDAD REFLEJA LA SOCIEDAD, ENTONCES LA PUBLICIDAD ES RACISTA
medium.com/@CarlWJones/si-la-publicidad-refleja-la-sociedad-entonces-la-publicidad-es-racista-632008653d3aSI
www.latinspots.com/sp/noticia/carl-jones-si-la-publicidad-refleja-la-sociedad-entonces-la-publicidad-es-racista/62974SI (01/08/22). Carl Jones, quien cuenta con una larga y premiada trayectoria en la industria de la publicidad Mexicana, tiene una profunda adoración por México, su historia y su cultura. El publicista ex VP-ECD de BBDO México, y Y&R México, Grey Canadá, y ex presidente del Circulo Creativo México actualmente completando su doctorado en el Royal College of Art (RCA) en Londres, Reino Unido sobre la descolonización de la publicidad, buscando justificar la forma de eliminar el pensamiento colonialista reflejado en los mensajes publicitarios en México, ha sido testigo de cómo el racismo y el clasismo se manifiestan en los anuncios. En su investigación publicada examina cómo ésta publicidad aspiracional demuestra y expone las desigualdades raciales y sociales en México y refuerza el pensamiento colonialista. |
|
Ads send out more than the clients’ message.
medium.com/hacker-maker-teacher-thief/ads-send-out-more-than-the-clients-message-d92d368c69e1
Version esp aqui: medium.com/@CarlWJones/los-anuncios-comunican-más-que-el-mensaje-del-cliente-8d56b7543ebe As creatives we are trained to take a problem and solve it using advertising tools and techniques. Messages are designed to sell a product or service, and we do not necessarily consider the consequences that a branded message has on society. We focus on an ad’s creation, its cumulative effect, and rarely pay attention to how advertising reflects what is considered ‘normal’ within society.As creatives we are trained to take a problem and solve it using advertising tools and techniques. Messages are designed to sell a product or service, and we do not necessarily consider the consequences that a branded message has on society. We focus on an ad’s creation, its cumulative effect, and rarely pay attention to how advertising reflects what is considered ‘normal’ within society. |
|
Decolonising Advertising through content creation, broadcast on social media, to inspire social transformation.
medium.com/@CarlWJones/decolonising-advertising-through-content-creation-broadcast-on-social-media-to-inspire-social-a429d4ded064
khk.rwth-aachen.de/2022/12/02/5074/5074/ I argue that Advertising in Mexico is a means employed by the ruling class in order to colonize Mexican society. It re-enforces a colonial thinking that started to be imposed five centuries ago by invaders of what is currently called the nation state of Mexico. My argument is based on a theoretical framework that maps the history of key concepts such as Post-colonisation and Decolonization. Anzaldua and Drussel’s definition of colonization from a Latin American point of view, and Mignolo’s observations on decolonization through ‘delinking knowledge’ are applied to advertising to reveal how this field can possibly be decolonized. |
|
Christmas adverts: decoding the trusted formula used to pull on consumers’ heart strings
medium.com/@CarlWJones/christmas-adverts-decoding-the-trusted-formula-used-to-pull-on-consumers-heart-strings-5fbac7146a9f theconversation.com/christmas-adverts-decoding-the-trusted-formula-used-to-pull-on-consumers-heart-strings-245487 This Christmas, major brands in the UK are spending more than £10 billion on advertising. And to justify the big spend, they are using sophisticated emotional marketing strategies to capture attention and boost sales. One approach to understanding how these adverts work is by using a framework designed by the social psychologist William McGuire. He identified six steps that help a brand influence the behaviour of the consumer. It starts with presenting the message, followed by the audience paying attention and then understanding it. The viewer then needs to agree with the message, remember it, and then finally respond or behave in the appropriate way – by consuming. |
|
The ‘romantic’ advertising tricks that give you unrealistic expectations of love
https://theconversation.com/the-romantic-advertising-tricks-that-give-you-unrealistic-expectations-of-love-249672 The run up to February 14 is a good time for selling certain products. And alongside the jewellery and flowers, advertisers also try to sell us something broader: a notion of what we should consider romantic. This might involve an idyllic and perfectly filmed holiday destination, or the casting of a glamorous Hollywood star to represent a particular perfume. For research has shown that advertising can shape our expectations of what love should look like – from the perfect partner to the things we should buy for them. |
|
Interrogating Democracy in the Digital Gaze
https://ijcmr.online/2/article/view/74 I first started to explore the digital gaze in late 2014 through a video project that later expanded into 7 x 2D large photographic images in 2019. This Multi-Piece Portfolio project explores the digital gaze, questions the democracy of Google, and investigates the type of visual registry provided, by asking: Is the digital gaze a Caucasian heterosexual male gaze? Christopher Frayling claims that ‘research through art and design’ is one of three research methods that artists could select in order to perform academic research. I, however, reverse the name of the method from ‘research through art’ to ‘art through research’. Performed in two phases, the first phase of the Digital Gaze project is academic research that is followed by phase two – the artistic expression informed by the first phase, hence the term ‘Art through Research’. El racismo en los medios de comunicación en México: perspectivas interdisciplinarias
Descolonízando la publicidad https://books.google.com.mx/books?hl=en&lr=&id=UZ55EQAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PA43&dq=info:mO7TRAaogugJ:scholar.google.com&ots=rCMHT0K4BH&sig=KpccZlA_Q_aoyMDfgVu1mdAtOEM&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false La publicidad, en su estado actual en México, puede ser considerada como una forma de colonización. Durante los últimos cien años, las agencias de publicidad occidentales “invadieron” los países en desarrollo y promovieron las marcas de sus clientes utilizando las herramientas y técnicas publicitarias que aquí serán discutidas. En este texto se argumenta que la publicidad 2D contemporánea difunde mensajes secundarios que refuerzan conceptos coloniales como la desigualdad racial y de clase, así como una ideología neoliberal que apoya a la clase gobernante. El objetivo principal del presente capítulo¹ es discutir la descolonización de la práctica de la publicidad. Por ello, primero se va a explorar la historia de la construcción de México y el concepto de la raza; después se abordará la historia de la publicidad mexicana; posteriormente se explicará el concepto de descolonización de acuerdo con la visión de diversos teóricos y académicos latinoamericanos; y, finalmente, se van a plantear algunas posibles soluciones para lograr la descolonización de la práctica publicitaria en México. Decolonising Advertising through Diversity: Practical strategies for challenging colonial thinking and practices in the production of publicity campaigns within the spectacle of Mexican Advertising.
https://researchonline.rca.ac.uk/6502/1/Thesis.Carl.JonesReducedFINAL.docx_.pdf This practice-based PhD asks How can a decolonised poster campaign generate a conversation about the production of colonial and racist thinking through the spectacle of publicity and create greater diversity in Mexican Advertising? Hybrid practice-academic methods explore how a multimodal campaign can disrupt the colonial and racist thinking underlying Mexican Advertising. The original contribution is through a decolonial process of researching visual communication, combining ‘practice process’ and academic ‘workshop development,’ mixed with theorised accounts. The Empirical research examines 500 years of 2D visual communication, including the construction of race through Pinturas de Castas that visually categorized peoples in colonial Mexico, to present day outdoor billboards for department store El Palacio De Hierro that is analysed using Visual Semiotics, revealing that this campaign consciously erases certain racial groups representing millions of Mexicans. A theory framework maps the history of key concepts such as Post-colonisation and Decolonisation, with a focus on Latin American theorists Mignolo, Figueroa, Cusicanqui and Boaventura. Five Phases structure the practice part of this PhD. Phase One is a Mexican Communications Review. Phase Two is working with local peoples and sets the groundwork for Phase Three, which is a decolonised visual practice in the form of a multimodal weaponised poster campaign. This is then followed by Phase Four which is a content analysis of the media coverage reaction to observe the industries’ and publics response. Phase Five are the outcomes with the researcher working with the Mexican advertising community searching for solutions. The findings reveal that instead of being a top-down process, advertising practices can be questioned from the bottom up, by taking what Audrey Lorde defines as ‘the master’s tools’ and delinking them through collaboration with local peoples and creating a conversation in the media to remove colonialthinking from branded messages and create greater diversity in Mexican Advertising. This research explores new hybrid practice-academic methods to accelerate change, and it is an original form of altering the Mexican public's understanding of what it means to be Mexican, by showing how colonial thinking can be removed from Mexican publicity practices to resist the racist spectacle through a methodological activism approach. This research in and of itself does not resolve the problem of decolonising but is making a small contribution to this area by creating greater diversity in Mexican Advertising through subversive strategies. Key words: Advertising. Decolonization. Decolonisation. Mexico. Semiotics. Racism. Activism. PR. Hybrid. Mexico. |
Descolonizando la publicidad a través de la diversidad: Estrategias prácticas para desafiar el pensamiento y las prácticas coloniales en la producción de campañas publicitarias dentro
del espectáculo de la publicidad mexicana.
https://researchonline.rca.ac.uk/6502/8/Thesis.Carl.JonesREVISION2espanolCreduce.pdf
Este doctorado práctico se pregunta: ¿Cómo puede una campaña de carteles descolonizados generar una conversación sobre la producción del pensamiento colonial y racista a través del espectáculo publicitario y crear una mayor diversidad en la publicidad mexicana? Métodos híbridos, prácticos y académicos, exploran cómo una campaña multimodal puede perturbar el pensamiento colonial y racista subyacente a la publicidad mexicana. La contribución original se basa en un proceso descolonial de investigación de la comunicación visual, que combina el proceso práctico y el desarrollo de talleres académicos, junto con teorías.
La investigación empírica examina 500 años de comunicación visual 2D, incluyendo la construcción de la raza a través de las Pinturas de Castas, que categorizaban visualmente a los pueblos del México colonial, hasta las vallas publicitarias actuales de la tienda departamental El Palacio de Hierro, analizadas mediante semiótica visual, revelando que esta campaña borra conscientemente a ciertos grupos raciales que representan a millones de mexicanos.
Palabras clave: Publicidad. Descolonización. México. Semiótica. Racismo. Activismo. Relaciones Públicas. Híbrido. México.
del espectáculo de la publicidad mexicana.
https://researchonline.rca.ac.uk/6502/8/Thesis.Carl.JonesREVISION2espanolCreduce.pdf
Este doctorado práctico se pregunta: ¿Cómo puede una campaña de carteles descolonizados generar una conversación sobre la producción del pensamiento colonial y racista a través del espectáculo publicitario y crear una mayor diversidad en la publicidad mexicana? Métodos híbridos, prácticos y académicos, exploran cómo una campaña multimodal puede perturbar el pensamiento colonial y racista subyacente a la publicidad mexicana. La contribución original se basa en un proceso descolonial de investigación de la comunicación visual, que combina el proceso práctico y el desarrollo de talleres académicos, junto con teorías.
La investigación empírica examina 500 años de comunicación visual 2D, incluyendo la construcción de la raza a través de las Pinturas de Castas, que categorizaban visualmente a los pueblos del México colonial, hasta las vallas publicitarias actuales de la tienda departamental El Palacio de Hierro, analizadas mediante semiótica visual, revelando que esta campaña borra conscientemente a ciertos grupos raciales que representan a millones de mexicanos.
Palabras clave: Publicidad. Descolonización. México. Semiótica. Racismo. Activismo. Relaciones Públicas. Híbrido. México.
